Just an idea....or maybe two

As many of you know, I'm just returning from a 2 week trip to Egypt and Israel. If you're like me, when you get home, it's so overwhelming to sift through thousands (yes I said "thousands") of pictures, edit them, and organize them. So, I thought I'd give a few helpful hints of how I'm working to conquer this daunting task.

• While on vacation, take a laptop and download your pictures nightly. Generally, you have a few free hours in the evening, and this is the perfect way to remember what you did that day by reviewing your photos, downloading them, and editing them.
• Also, if possible, have a "scribe" to take notes for you in a travel journal. My mom served as the perfect scribe because her handwriting is neat and she watched what I was taking photos of, then notated it in her journal.
• Finally, don't feel that you have to print every picture, or tell every story. It's impossible. Just pick out what is most meaningful to you and begin there.

There are many ways to document a trip, and of course scrapbooking is one way of doing so. You could create a mini-album for each town you visited or for the highlights of your trip. I decided to create a photo-book for this trip since I wanted duplicate copies (one for me, one for my parents). I created this one at Walgreens, but MPix and Shutterfly also have similar versions.

This is the cover of the 8x11" album. It is leather, and the base price is $25, but I added so many pages, that it ended up costing $50. The good thing about Walgreens, is that multiple copies are 25% off, plus they share a shipping cost.

As you can see, the pages can be arranged how you choose, with multiple layout options. The page on the right, is a standard option at Walgreens, but the left is a layout meant for one photo. I liked the LO, but it wasn't an option to input 6 photos, so I created a single 4x6" blank file in Photoshop Elements, then input my photos in 2x2" squares, saved the file and uploaded it as a single photo file at Walgreens. From there, I was able to insert the photo as a single photo and get the look I wanted.

This is another example of a single photo LO. The LO with the camels is the exact LO as the man rowing the boat. Here, I created an 8x11" blank file and uploaded the camels accordingly. Also pictured here is an option to only have text on a page. I loved the look of blank space to capture this memory of the Beduins (nomads) asking us repeatedly (at least 989 times) if we wanted a camel to ride up Mt. Sinai. The only word they knew was "Camel?"
And, while we're on the subject of text only and using it to preserve memories, Celeste has a very cool challenge on her blog using this as inspiration.
Is this awesome or what? And, she's giving away a RAK!